The Financial Therapy Podcast - It's Not Just About The Money

What if the most powerful thing you could offer another person isn’t advice—but presence? In this conversation, Rick Kahler explores a profound shift in financial therapy through the lens of end-of-life work: the quiet power of “witnessing.” Drawing on insights from death doula Rose Zealand, he reveals how transformation doesn’t come from fixing—but from creating a space of non-judgment where clie...

What if the hardest financial planning work isn’t about numbers—but sitting with someone who’s dying? Rose Zealand reframes birth and death as parallel forms of “labor,” involving both the individual and their circle of care. She exposes a critical gap in traditional planning: when a midlife diagnosis hits, technical advice collides with shock and emotional shutdown. As both CFP® and death doula,...

Under the leadership of Dr. Megan Ford, the University of Georgia is training the next generation of financial therapists in a way few institutions can. Inside the Love and Money Center, financial planning students and couple and family therapy students learn side by side—sometimes even sitting together with real clients as money stress and relationship conflict unfold in real time. Rather than se...

Why do smart, capable people ignore advice they genuinely believe is good for them? In this episode, Joy Slabaugh—a CFP® and Certified Internal Family Systems (IFS) Therapist—joins the conversation to explore why behavior change rarely comes from better information alone. Joy explains how IFS helps financial planners understand the internal conflicts people experience around money, and why working...

What if some of our most persistent money problems aren’t budgeting issues at all—but trauma responses we’ve never named? This conversation pushes past polite financial talk and questions some deeply held beliefs: that healing has to hurt, that more money means more fulfillment, and that trauma is either everywhere or nowhere at all. Joy offers a sharp critique of both the financial industry’s emo...

Money has a way of exposing parts of us we’d rather not see, and as Ed Coambs, CFP, CFT makes clear in this conversation, wealth doesn’t protect us from that. Together, Rick and Ed unpack why money anxiety grows right alongside income, how attachment styles quietly shape our financial decisions, and why couples keep having the same money fights no matter how smart or successful they are. Through p...

Most of our money struggles don’t start with numbers—they start with personality. In this conversation, Rick sits down with Khara Croswaite Brindle to explore how each Enneagram type relates to money in strikingly different ways. Achievers often tie worth to financial success, helpers give until their own security erodes, loyalists manage money through anxiety and vigilance, and enthusiasts stay f...

Financial therapy isn’t about having the right tools—it’s about having the courage to face your own money story first. In this conversation, Khara Croswaite speaks candidly about burnout, money avoidance, and the quiet damage that can happen when helpers skip their own inner work. Through her path from mental health therapy to financial therapy, a hard truth emerges: we can’t ethically ask clients...

What if the fastest path to your Enneagram type wasn’t testing or theory—but listening to your parts? In this conversation, Rick Kahler and Enneagram veteran Joan Ryan explore a powerful, emerging approach: using Internal Family Systems (IFS) as a direct pathway to accurate Enneagram typing. Joan explains how the Enneagram offers a reliable map of core motivations, while IFS provides the method to...

What happens in the wide gray space between financial therapy and life planning? In this rich, unscripted conversation, Rick explores that question with a next-generation leader who brings both heart and rigor to the future of financial planning. Together, they unpack the difference between “snorkeling” and “scuba diving” with clients, why deep listening and long pauses can be more transformative...

What happens when money struggles, relationship patterns, and personal history all collide in the same room? In this wide-ranging and deeply human conversation, Rick Kahler sits down with Dr. Megan Ford to explore how financial therapy grew out of systems thinking, why “fixing one person” rarely fixes anything, and how our earliest money wounds quietly shape our adult lives. Megan shares her journ...

When financial conversations start sounding like political debates, something deeper is going on, and this piece explores why facts can feel threatening when emotions take the driver’s seat. It highlights how polarization has eroded our shared understanding of basic economic principles, leaving advisors torn between honesty and clients’ emotional reactions. Drawing on the lens of financial therapy...

Most of us hear the word “socialism” and picture a single, monolithic system—but this episode unpacks four very different versions of it and reveals how much fear and old conditioning shape our reactions to economic ideas. Through an unexpectedly personal journey, Rick traces how his Cold War–era assumptions unraveled as he explored the distinctions between State Socialism, State Capitalism, worke...

What if the way you pay is part of the therapy? Some psychoanalytic therapists ask for cash after each session—not for convenience, but because money itself reveals emotional truth. Forgetting to pay, overpaying, or haggling can uncover hidden dynamics worth exploring. Vessy explains how two sessions a week can go far deeper than one and why honest talk about fees is as essential as discussing fee...

Real change with money isn’t about willpower—it’s about the brain rewriting old rules. In this conversation, Rick and financial therapist Emily Shull explore how memory reconsolidation and IFS work together to transform money behavior. Emily explains the four elements of deep change and shares a powerful client story where a childhood belief about money secrecy dissolved, leading to honest communi...

Here’s a fresh way to choose the right “money-and-meaning” help: this conversation maps the entire financial therapy spectrum as a simple two-axis quadrant: financial to psychotherapy and shallow to deep, then shows where options like books, coaching, financial planning, CBT, IFS, and psychoanalysis actually sit, and how to know what you need; with guest Vessy Tasheva, Rick explores why credential...

When faith dictates money, the fallout can be devastating—especially for women. In this conversation with Sarah Carr, the focus turns to how rigid gender roles, abuse, and teachings like “God will provide” leave families financially vulnerable and women without autonomy. They explore how inherited beliefs around worthiness, guilt, and divine blessing shape earning potential, retirement savings, an...

What happens when belonging is tied to your bank account? This piece shows how cult-like religious environments turn “sacrificial giving” into financial control, leaving money scripts like “If I don’t give, I’ll be rejected.” Through client stories—including retirees pressured to keep giving—it highlights how loss of community magnifies money fears. Reframing generosity beyond dollars helps protec...

What if money works like skin—protecting, signaling, and setting boundaries? Dublin-based psychoanalytic psychotherapist and financial therapist Vessy Tasheva shares how trust, reliability, and clear limits shape the healing process. From earliest money memories and family genograms to the subtle ways clients “test” safety, she shows why financial therapy is about emotions, not advice. By holding...

Anxiety in the face of shifting headlines isn’t irrational—it often mirrors how state-controlled markets actually behave: lower returns, higher volatility, and a wobblier ride. The lesson isn’t to avoid these markets entirely, but to recognize their place in a diversified portfolio while resisting the urge to overreact when headlines spark fear. By slowing down, noticing which parts of us are pani...

Rick Kahler unpacks a recent article in The Jerusalem Post that mistakenly equated financial well-being with financial independence, highlighting why the two are not the same. Drawing on research and his experience in financial therapy, he explains how financial wellness is about more than income or net worth—it’s about meeting obligations, feeling secure, and having choices. Just as importantly,...

In this powerful episode, Rick Kahler and Joetta Johnson go beyond theory and guide listeners through a live hypnosis experience centered on connecting with their 80-year-old future self. Joetta explains how this practice, rooted in both hypnosis and Internal Family Systems (IFS), allows individuals to revisit painful financial memories, reframe limiting beliefs, and receive wisdom from their imag...

In this insightful column, Rick Kahler explores how clinical hypnosis offers a profound yet underutilized method for transforming financial behavior. Drawing from Joetta Johnson’s expertise, he explains how hypnosis accesses the brain’s emotional memory systems—often the true source of irrational money behaviors like avoidance, overspending, or shutdown. Unlike logic-based approaches, hypnosis wor...

Joetta Johnson returns with Rick Kahler to dive deep into the emotional and subconscious roots of underearning. Sharing her personal transformation and the development of her “Earning Power” program, Joetta unpacks how limiting beliefs, especially those rooted in authority figures, time scarcity, and undervaluing oneself, can sabotage financial progress, even after income increases. She challenges...

Rick Kahler sits down with Joetta Johnson to explore how designing a career around how you want your life to feel can lead to deeper fulfillment and authenticity. From her early days at Deloitte to becoming a pioneer in conscious financial coaching, Joetta’s story is a powerful reminder that clarity doesn’t always start with a job title—it starts with values. This inspiring conversation dives into...